Bitter Harvest delves into the untold history of Stalin’s genocidal tactic of “death by starvation” of the Ukranian people in the 1930s. Killing somewhere between 7 million and 10 million people, Holodomor was covered up by Soviet propaganda and only in the last decades has the true extent of what is now considered a crime against humanity been discovered. Director George Mendeluk, himself of Ukrainian descent, explores the period through the lens of a love story between a young couple, Yuri and Natalka, played by Max Irons and Samantha Banks, who must both face the violence and repression of the regime and find their way back to one another. We sat down with the pair to discuss what is was like working together, discovering more about Ukraine’s culture and history, and the challenges in filming the movie’s most gritty scenes.